


just a ripped and bloodied claw

by veilfire



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Character Study, Dalish/Skinner - Freeform, Demands of the Qun, M/M, female Adaar/Sera/Dagna
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-21
Updated: 2016-06-21
Packaged: 2018-07-16 12:07:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,310
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7267519
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/veilfire/pseuds/veilfire
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hissrad falls, and the Iron Bull falls with him—in more way than one.</p>
            </blockquote>





	just a ripped and bloodied claw

**Author's Note:**

> title stolen from archie bronson outfit's _dart for my sweetheart_. beta by [jasper](http://archiveofourown.org/users/JustJasper/pseuds/JustJasper). she's a sweetheart ♥

There's a rhythm to what they do; its starting point—Dorian's sadness.

The Bull likes it the most when they’re both in Skyhold, and Dorian comes to him the same night. Like a thief in the dark, yes. The Bull doesn’t mind. 

When they’re both in the field, Dorian waits. Makes _him_ wait. He wears his sadness like a cloak, heavier with each passing day, until they’re back and stumble into the Bull’s bed.

The Bull can only suspect that it’s the same when he stays in Skyhold and Adaar takes Dorian out—adventuring. Spelunking. Whatever it is they do when the Bull’s not around.

Where Dorian goes, what he does, when he is in Skyhold and the Bull isn’t, the Bull doesn’t want to know.

* 

On the sidelines of the training ground, Adaar’s white braid shines like a silvery underside of a fern leaf under the unforgiving Seheron sun. She is so young, the Bull thinks. He puts his whetting stone away, looking up at her. She puts her hands on her hips.

“Look,” she says. “I know he’s my friend, but he’s _using_ you and you’re _letting_ him.”

“You barely give two shits about me,” the Bull says.

“I don’t have two shits to give about you.” 

Adaar tugs at her braid, angrily. Was I ever so young, the Bull thinks. They both look away in the same moment.

“Nevermind.” She turns away from him. Her nose is broken in two places. Kinda like his. “It was a fucking stupid idea to come to you.”

*

There’s a rhythm to what they do; it’s starts with Dorian’s sadness. And Dorian is sad aplenty.

*

He’s coming back from Val Royeaux with the Chargers when he finds the latest missive, two layers of thick, greased leather hidden in a vault hidden in a secret cache—hiding a piece of parchment. Spying business at its finest.

The Bull deciphers the code in his tent by the light of three candles, burning down.

Then he looks.

Stares.

And stares.

It’s like his brain can’t catch up to the words in front of his eye.

The Qun here, in the mainland. The Qun asking for Adaar.

The Qun asking for him, of him, maybe of all of them.

Nausea hits him like a battering ram to the stomach and he barely makes it past the tent’s flap before he’s puking his guts out.

Damned Krem putting fucking Rocky on the kitchen duty. _Again_.

*

The Inquisitor’s not in Skyhold when they get back.

His boys disperse, complaining about their sore asses and faces burned red by the sun. He’d made them hurry. He’d made them hurry _like shit._.

And Adaar isn’t even home.

He could ask Josie, or Leliana, or even Cass, if she’s stayed in. Instead, he heads straight for the library.

He could pretend it’s because it’s the shortest route to Leliana’s post. 

He could.

He doesn’t.

*

Dorian sits curled in his chair. He doesn’t hear the Bull approach. He’s chewing on the feathery tip of his quill, a collection of mugs and plates on the windowsill behind him, and the Bull is sure that if he bent to look under Dorian’s chair, he’d find a bottle of wine stashed there. Probably half-empty.

A corner of the Bull’s mouth yanks upwards.

Books stashed everywhere, and pieces of parchment scattered on the floor, and Dorian, sitting above it all like a dragon on a throne of gold.

If the Bull ripped his chest apart, golden light would spill from him, inside out.

 _If_. Fucking hilarious word.

“Where’s Adaar?” the Bull asks. 

Dorian almost chokes on his quill. He puts his hand to his chest, makes a show of wiping his brow.

The Bull could watch him for hours.

“You’ve returned!” Dorian says. “I had no idea. The scouts tell me nothing.”

“You sure you ask nice enough?” the Bull says. He—hadn’t meant to. But it’s easy, talking about trivial shit.

Talking to Dorian about trivial shit.

They make it _flow_.

Dorian shrugs. “You know me. I’m all manners and no tact. Most Fereldans don’t know how to appreciate it properly.”

The Bull is pretty sure some of those Fereldan scouts had been seen leaving Dorian’s quarters at all hours of the night. He shakes his head. “Adaar,” he reminds Dorian. “Quick trip to the Hinterlands?”

“No, actually. Blackwall and Sera found another shard during their reconnaissance of the Emprise. Adaar took them and Solas, and they went to open another gate in Solasan.”

Oh.

“Oh.” 

The Bull has no idea what his face is doing. It must be doing something, because Dorian gets up and takes a step towards him.

The Bull takes a step back and turns. “Well, nevermind then.” Forced cheer in his voice. “I’ll see you around, Dorian.”

“Bull, are you quite alright?” Dorian calls after him.

The Bull flees.

*

He could tell them the Inquisitor was—unavailable. Nothing the Bull could do.

Abso-fucking-lutely nothing.

*

What could Hissrad do?

*

Two bells before dinner, and Dorian slips into his room, a bottle of wine and two glasses in his hands.

“You’re not alright,” he says—and pours wine, to the brim, not like nobility at all. 

His smile has a gentle curve to it. His eyes seem too dark in the hazy afternoon light. They clink their glasses and drink. Just a sip before Dorian asks: “Do you want to talk?” The Bull shakes his head. Dorian looks at him for a good while longer, eyes searching— unsettling. Unsettled. Finally, he sighs. “Well then. Do you want to fuck?”

*

There’s a rhythm to what they’re doing, and sometimes it’s the rhythm of Dorian’s thrusts, reverberating through the Bull, toes to ribs, fingers to sternum, inside the skull, like a fluttering firefly. Bones, muscles, and fat; they’re bones, muscles, and fat. And smoke. And ash.

It chokes, chokes, chokes him, more than he’d choked on Dorian’s cock before.

Dorian’s cock jerks inside of him. Dorian’s fist, full of the Bull’s cock, twists.

“Bull,” Dorian says. “Bull.” He comes. The Bull comes. They come together, and they come apart, and in the seams, smoke rises, ash falls.

Angling his head away from Dorian, the Bull—blinks his eye dry.

*

“It’s the Ben-Hassrath,” he tells Dorian later. Dorian’s palm is warm between his shoulder blades. Sweaty. It doesn’t stop moving.

“Mhm,” Dorian hums. The Bull turns to him. Dorian props himself on his elbow. “What do they want from the Inquisition?”

“There could be—an alliance,” the Bull says.

“An alliance,” Dorian repeats, flat. Crinkles in the corners of his eyes. “Between Adaar and the Qun.” He flops on his back and laughs.

Adaar and the Qun. It _is_ ridiculous.

Dorian stops laughing. Puts a hand on the Bull’s shoulder, moves it up to his cheek. “Forgive me. It’s not a laughing matter.”

“It kinda is,” the Bull disagrees. He himself doesn’t laugh.

Dorian sighs. “Adaar left two days ago,” he starts. “If you sent a raven…” He cuts himself short. Shakes his head. “It’s no business of mine. I apologize.”

The Bull puts a thumb to his lips.

He’d already sent a raven. Now all there is to do is wait. 

He curls around Dorian, and his heart beats: wait with me, wait with me, wait with me.

*

Adaar flips her shit.

“It’s a trap,” she says.

“No fucking way,” she shouts.

She slams the door in his face.

She’s back not an hour later.

Adaar isn’t afraid of an invasion on the mainland; she’s terrified. The Bull knows it’s the only reason why she’d let him stay.

“I don’t trust them,” she says.

“I know,” the Bull says. “We aren’t talking about trust here.”

She puts the end of her braid in her mouth. Spits it out when she sees him looking. “Okay,” she says. “Okay. How do we do it? Cullen and the troops?”

“No. Small party, the fewer the better. I’ll take the Chargers.”

She doesn’t like it, he can tell. But she bites her lips and says nothing. Then: “Okay. Who do you want there?”

Without his permission, his eye wanders to the window and past it, to the rotunda. Dorian’s window even faces this way. It is dark. Dorian is drinking with Sera, the Bull knows. They’d invited him.

“No,” Adaar says. “I won’t ask him.” The braid is back in her mouth, and with it between her teeth, she stares the Bull down. 

“No mages,” he concedes. Like she isn’t a mage herself.

Adaar sighs. “That’s not what I— Maybe you should ask him yourself?”

“Boss,” the Bull says. “No.”

He goes to sleep. Alone.

In the morning, Dorian is there by their horses, joking with Dalish. Somewhere close, Skinner’s probably on the verge of putting a blade between his ribs, as one does among friends.

*

He sees it, now. Adaar and Gatt, similar anger inside. They express it differently but… No wonder the Bull has a soft spot for her.

Dorian by his side. He wants to say something, the Bull thinks. He is—attuned to Dorian. In a way. 

He turns to him.

In his peripheral vision, Gatt frowns.

Dorian huffs and leaves the Bull’s side.

*

Adaar makes a move—for his sounding horn. Dorian stops her, his staff between her hand and the Bull. His face— The Bull can’t look at his face.

“Bull!” Adaar’s voice is almost louder than the damned horn would've been, but she doesn’t try to reach him anymore. “Call the retreat!”

It’s an order, the Bull tells himself. Order.

His fingers are slippery on the horn’s handle. They leave a bloody mark. 

His lungs, though— His lungs are full of air.

*

He doesn’t leave the Chargers on their way home. He doesn’t stare ahead. 

Dorian—far to the fore, his head the only dark one between Adaar’s braid and Sera’s mop. The Bull can’t help but notice when Dorian turns it back.

*

There used to be a rhythm to what they’d done. Maybe there still is, but the Bull doesn’t recognize it. No rhythm to his life now.

But—there’s Dorian somewhere in there. 

Sometimes. 

More often than not.

* 

A trip from Val Royeax takes much less now that he doesn’t check the caches. This particular one would be taking a bit more—if he hadn’t let Dalish lead. He had. He had also left Skinner in Skyhold, and so: they ride hard. It’s about an anniversary, or something.

The Bull has a feeling this time around he’ll be the one complaining about his sore ass. He doesn’t mind one whit.

They arrive in the middle of the afternoon—and in the middle of a party.

The main floor of Herald’s Rest is cleared of furniture. People are backed into the walls and the corners, some sitting on stairs, some—on Cabot's counter. All have tankards in hands.

In the emptied space, Dorian and Adaar and Dagna, linked by the elbows, in some kind of ridiculous dance.

Sera bumps into his side. “They did magic! It went boom!” She looks—drunk. And flushed. And happy.

“Would’ve thought it would’ve had your panties more in a twist.”

Sera laughs. “Dagna had. My panties in a twist. Hand inside.” She makes a helpful gesture in case he didn’t understand. The Bull does. “Adaar too! We all had our panties in a twist.”

“I’m happy for your luck,” he tells her. She slurps her drink. It smells vaguely strawberry-like. He suspects Dorian.

Dorian, who spots him and wiggles out of Adaar and Dagna’s grip. 

They startle, and lose their footing. They don’t stop. Adaar says something to Dorian, her loose hair covering up her face. The Bull can’t read her lips. Dorian links her elbow with Dagna’s and spins on his heel to bow to the audience. Behind his back, Adaar gives the Bull the thumbs up.

By his side, Sera spits a mouthful of her drink.

Dorian is walking up to them in a very straight line. 

“Pshht,” Sera says. “Don’t fall for it. He’s shitfaced.”

“My darling Sera,” Dorian says, putting his hands on the Bull’s pectorals. “Aren’t we all? We’ve been drinking since the fourth bell,” he informs the Bull very solemnly.

Sera cracks up. “I puked! You didn’t!” she announces, gulps down her drink in one go, and joins Adaar and Dagna on the floor. 

Dorian’s fingers curl around the Bull’s hand. “Let’s go,” he says. “This gathering bores me.”

Once more on the same day, the Bull lets himself be led.

They fall on the stairs, twice, and stumble on thresholds, more than twice. By the time the Bull closes the door of his room behind them, Dorian is chortling. The Bull holds him. Kisses the top of his head. “You _are_ shitfaced,” he says. 

Dorian squints up at him “No,” he says. Sighs. “Alright, maybe yes. A little. I am also—” A pause. The Bull’s heart trips on it. “Quite happy, I would say.”

The Bull puts his palm on the side of Dorian’s face, thumb making small circles under his eye. “Are you, now?” he murmurs. 

Dorian pushes him towards the bed. They land heavily on top of it. The Bull can smell clean sheets. He hadn’t changed them before he’d left.

Dorian scrambles up. “Don’t you believe me?” he says, straddling the Bull’s waist.

“I always believe you.” The Bull puts his hands on Dorian’s thighs. “Just— You used to be such a sour drunk.”

Dorian rises on his knees and, before the Bull can miss the contact between them, loses his balance, tumbling forwards, towards the Bull. He catches himself on one arm, inches above the Bull’s face.

"Like Adaar always says: things change."

He stinks. The Bull stinks. They slip into a kiss, the most ungraceful one in the Bull’s entire life. 

Not an ounce of finesse to it—and no rhythm.

**Author's Note:**

> what can i say, i have a lot of feelings about bull having feelings.


End file.
